the wheels turn, unchecked
by AkaOkamiRyu
Summary: The Games took my baby brother long before the Reaping, years before he volunteered to fight them. - Cato's sister looks back on moments in his life.


After a LONG hiatus (it's been five years since I published anything on this site, ten since I joined), I am back. I've written lots of little things over the intervening years, so perhaps I'll be posting some of those in near future.

This is just something that got caught in my head after seeing the movie again on Sunday. I did take some liberties: they mention Cato's family during _Catching Fire_ but I've ignored that and instead given him a sister, a father and a grandfather. I wanted this sister and Cato to sort of foil Katniss/Prim, show the contrast and similarity between their situations.

In my mind this takes place during the games, hence the section about the Reaping and Cato's death will be in present tense and the rest in past as his sister is thinking back.

Disclaimer: I don't own Hunger Games, or anything related. Only the ideas and the family are my own.

- the wheels turn, [unchecked] -

* * *

><p>It's funny, what you remember when you look back over a life, how sharp the details can be.<p>

* * *

><p>I remember the day he was born. I was seven years old.<p>

He came into the world fiercely, just as he would one day go out of it and much the same as his end, his beginning brought death. At nearly nine pounds, he was too big, too fierce, too strong—our small, gentle mother never stood a chance.

With our father gone working as a head peacekeeper in other districts, we were brought up by our grandfather: a haggard old fellow who had once been a brutal peacekeeper himself, now regulated to a quiet life that never truly suited him. He probably loved us in some way, but he rarely showed it. His affection was demonstrated in the rare display of pride, brought about whenever we had managed to do something that suited his taste. Cato earned the most of that. Cato was much too like our grandfather.

Still, I loved him and as a little boy, he loved me too.

* * *

><p>It's hard to imagine, but he was sweet and affectionate once (and in some ways, he was until the end, at least with me).<p>

He used to run up the road as I walked home from school each afternoon, his tiny feet churning up the mine dust that settled there, arms stretched out for me to catch him up. I'd swing him about in my arms as he babbled excitedly, telling me about his day—his adventures in the backyard, the rocks he had found, the 'games' he'd played with grandfather—talking so quickly I could barely understand him. I would set him down, kiss his cheek and remind him gently to breathe and slow down. We'd walk the half-mile back to the house hand in hand. (It took me two years to realize those 'games' were just my grandfather's way of starting his training. By then, it was too late, the wheels were in motion).

* * *

><p>It was when he turned five that the changes began in earnest, partially because he started school and began to spend time with people other than myself and grandfather (and our father's occasional visit home).<p>

It was also partially because it was the first year I was eligible for the Reaping.

Too small, too clumsy and, on the whole, too soft and scarred by the memory of our mother's death—I was never recommended for special training. I went to regular school without question. (I also imagine my mother made my father promise her only daughter would never have to fight for her life, but that's a question I'll never have answered). Still, we all knew what the Hunger Games were, all knew what Reaping meant and while it had been explained that in District 2 the Reaping was more for formality—the strongest eighteen year old would volunteer for whoever was chosen—I was still terrified. If I went to the Games, who would be there for my brother?

Cato, still too young to fully understand what the Games meant, could tell I was scared but could not fathom why. All he knew about Reaping Day was that it involved a very scratchy bath and fancy clothes and a walk to the center of the district, the next village over, where I would hold him tight to me as all the noise happened. That year was different though. He grew first confused and then angry when I passed his hand to grandfather and walked off to a line of other children. He called out, but I was crying too much to look back, trying to drown out the sound of him yelling for me and grandfather silencing him with a slap.

Looking back, I wonder if that wasn't the moment that pushed it all too far to take back: when Cato made the first connection between Reaping Day, violence and fear.

Either way, when the next Reaping came, he did not call out as I passed his hand over and walked away, only regarded the rows of twelve to eighteen year olds and the stage with the first gleam of the aggression that would later control him.

* * *

><p>When he was ten, his training started.<p>

Like our father and grandfather, Cato would be gleaned for violence—whether that meant glory in the Games or a future as a peacekeeper. Schoolyard fights and once-a-week combat class in school had shown him to be a fighter: sturdy, strong, ruthless if he needed to be and clever about all of it. Cato was everything the district wanted in its future tributes. Grandfather's games had prepared him well.

He would go to the special training school.

The sweet little boy I had tried so hard to keep began to slip away.

* * *

><p>I remember watching the re-televised Reapings the year I was eighteen, the last year I would participate in them and the first year that Cato did. Going over the footage and names after, Ceasar Flickerman paused on District 2. I watched again as Zander, a boy I had known well, volunteered for the pale fourteen year old whose name was called. Over the image of him stepping forward, Flickerman commented, "and that is when a boy becomes a tribute."<p>

But it isn't.

It happens much earlier.

It happens the first day they come home from their special school with a gash under their eye, scraped knuckles and a bruised side and their boyish features reflect no pain, only eager excitement. And their little voice, still devoid a true man's deep timbre, boasts that the other boy is much worse: that he cried until the teacher stopped the fight.

That's when a boy ceases to be just a boy and instead becomes a tribute, becomes a pawn in the Capitol's perversion.

It happened to Cato when he was barely eleven.

* * *

><p>Tribute.<p>

The applause sounds hollow to my ears. My baby brother, the sweet little boy who used to run to me with open arms, now stands beside Clove wearing a daring, feral smirk, his arms crossed over his chest. Tribute, murderer, victim, Career. Whatever you call it, it's just a pretty name for a death sentence. One of them will not return, maybe both. Either way, there will be blood on their hands. Blood they can never wash away.

And they are eager. Proud.

Walking to the government building, I hate the men that walk before me. My father, my grandfather, their heads held high with arrogance. Their son, their grandson, their boy, their Cato will make them proud.

They go speak to him together: tell them they're proud, offer advice, remind him to be brutal, be ruthless. It's unnecessary: he already is. He's been made that way.

When they step out, I sweep past them, try to control the shaking in my hands, but the second the door closes I sob and fly into his arms, as he once did mine and for a moment, the aggression and the arrogance and the fierceness falters. He promises to do well, to fight hard, to come home, to make me proud.

As they escort me out, I look over my shoulder back at him, trying to find the little boy in his eyes. In the brief second that I do, for what I know, one way or the other, will be the last time, I tell him, "I already am."

* * *

><p>I don't cry when the muttations ravage his body, though I say a prayer of thanks as Katniss Everdeen ends his suffering with a well-placed arrow.<p>

I don't cry because there is nothing left to cry over. My baby brother was gone long before this moment. The Capitol, the Games, they took him years ago.

* * *

><p>It's a bit rambling, a little sporadic, but the scenes struck me so vibrantly, I had to let them out. Hopefully it made sense, and you enjoyed it.<p>

Feedback is greatly appreciated. This is my first Hunger Games story, my first published fanfic in ages, and I'd like to keep more actively writing, so suggestions would be helpful to that end.

If you have any questions/things you'd like cleared up, let me know, I'd be happy to clarify via email or site PM.

Have a lovely day! (May the odds be ever in your favor)

AkaOkamiRyu


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